There used to be a popular saying in the industry: "Microsoft doesn't get it right until version 3.0."
I say used to because you don't hear it very much any more. It was arguably true of Windows, which first hit its stride with version 3.0, but not for much else. The Xbox sold from the first incarnation. Windows CE passed the …

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We should vote with our wallets against corporate controlled single source app stores

If you want to be patronized like children and told what to do and what not to do with your devices, its still better to buy Apple than Microsoft.

But I think buying either will eventually land us in a corporate landscape where our mobile devices are treated like Sony's playstation: If you install an alternate OS or software on them, you get sued, cause you had to sign a lengthy agreement nobody reads, that forbids you to do anything that would circumvent all the toll booths they are planning to surround you with.

Here's Obviously!......

Re: Here's Obviously!......

<blockquote>. posting in articles he has no interest in except to slag thing off.

Why not try posting some constructive comments? Or even better just fuck off</blockquote>

Just to be a pedant, you have posted to tell some one they posted to an article they had no interest in yet did the same thing yourself. You then proceeded to do the same by slagging off the poster. You did not mention anything about the article except the article itself.

I will be considering W8 soon, it may get me away from Android for the first time in years as I feel that WP8 has solved a few issues that stopped me getting WP7.

Re: A Positive Review?

>Surely the end is nigh.

Not only that, but MS have gone back, rewritten and polished the OS, rather than try and introduce new 'features' and ways of working. Finally they've got the right idea. Cats and dogs living together etc.

Re: Re: A Positive Review?

Re: A Positive Review?

The only reason why they are talking nice about WP is because it locks you even tighter to telco's. You need a cloud account to do ANYTHING on these devices. Apple is a bit less restrictive in even setting up your device. The telco's see money because with everything you do, you need to go online...

The only advantage is that (when going for a Nokia device) that, at least, it doesn't require internet access when using it as a car navigation tool (unlike Google or Apple's offering). Otherwise it would just be the extreme milk-cow device for punters. Ripp off the folks, in the name of the cloud!

Re: A Positive Review?

Isn't it MS and Apple that get the money, not the telecos? Nokia went through torturous backflips to take into account operators' concerns, originally restricting OTA updates and the shop to the network instead of wifi and their agreements over operator billing.

Apple just drove a steamroller through all that and MS just copied Apple. If anything they bypass the telecos and just use them as a bit pipe when the user doesn't have wifi access.

WP 7.5 users aren't missing out much

I, too, have a Lumia 800, but after WP8 has finally launched I feel a lot less grumpy than before. Considering all the secrecy, I had expected something a bit more spectacular than what essentially (to the user) are generally minor improvements. Yes, I know, there's now the unified W8 kernel which is great, but for an user that's as exciting as reading the Android source code. Now WP8 has Opera Mobile-like web traffic compression (I guess the Yanks with their low data caps on their expensive contracts really need that, personally with unlimited data at £15 a month I can't care less), a kid's corner (which still doesn't prevent your new £600 phone from being dropped or physically abused by children), some rooms, limited Bluetooth transfer and Xbox Music (and both BT transfers and XB Music will come to WP 7.5 devices with the WP8 update anyways). We still haven't got a better browser interface with sane tab handling, or the capability to download and save locally any type of file (i.e. iso files). Oh, WP8 also come with a USB Storage mode, but it also got rid of Zune (which at least made Media transfers very easy and comfortable) and replaced it with some uncomfortable and inflexible sync utilities.

WP 8 is also said to be blazingly fast, but on the other side WP 7.5 is already completely fluent (much more than Android or iOS), even with just one core, so I can't see how much better it can be.

I'm sure I will eventually go for a WP 8 device, but not in the near future. There just aren't any compelling reasons to upgrade from my Lumia 800 at the moment. Maybe a year down the line this will be different.

Re: Sounds great.

Pretty sure the OS Kernel is gonna be the same for a while now so I think you will be all good with upgrades over the next couple of years. WP7.5 is nice, I am still using my samsung focus and still enjoy it's simplicity.

There are a few games/apps I would like every now and again that are not available but all in all I have really not had problems doing everything I wanted to on this phone.

Who knows, maybe MS will have a Surface Phone by the time you upgrade!!

Re: WP 7.5 users aren't missing out much

So wait drag and drop to a folder for syncing is too difficult

Yeah, well, it's not 1998 any more, and not everyone wants to have to manually fiddle around with folders if applications like Zune can manage TBs of videos and music and sync the titles one wants by the click of a button even if the phone is not connected to the computer (Zune can do sync over WiFi, another thing that got lost in WP8).

It's certainly great to have the option to access folders directly in WP8. It's not great when comfortable functionality has been removed.

Think you missed something

[QUOTE]One thing Windows Phone 8 early adopters may already be noticing about Microsoft's new operating system is that unlike Android and iOS, there's no notification centre.

Well turns out it's not a deliberate omission. It was meant to have one – Microsoft just didn't get it finished in time.

Let's face it: it's virtually unheard of for any great endeavour – be it Windows Phone 8, the Olympic Stadium or the lifesaving kebab you'll be scarfing down while staggering home later this evening – to arrive ahead of schedule. It's just how these things go.....................................[/QUOTE]

I thought you could..

WP8 looks and operates more-or-less like WP7 only it's got a honking great NT kernel in there, I'm at a loss to see how this is a great improvement. If you're tasked with selling phones, how are you going to sell that to customers who have already been ignoring WP7 in droves?

Battery Life

Like EddieD I have a Lumia 800 and have no issues with battery life, in fairness I do have a Vodafone Sure Signal so it's not really going to be expending a lot of effort trying to find a base station but the battery does last several days.

Re: Out of the box...

Re: Out of the box...

No it isn't. Even Nokia's own Symbian is vastly superior on many fronts than this handicapped, dememented monstrosity.

- no proper multitasking

- no full 2-way call recording

- no file manager

- no notifications

It's fast because Microsoft ditched most of their old WM-code. The same reason why Nokia Belle is fast (because nokia removed countless menus and capacities from Symbian e.g. disable theme efects menu or webfolders from filemanager etc...). In fact if cutting bits of productivity is needed to make stuff faster then your incompetent in my book. And in this book both Nokia and Microsoft are incompetent!

It's good that they're together. A match made in heaven destined to fail!

Re: Out of the box...

I don't know about Belle FP2 but theme effects are in Belle up to FP1, they're just off by default. It's in a submenu which just has one option (theme effects) buried in theme settings. I suppose that was some obscure hangover from S60 r3.

The removal of webdav support in Belle is annoying though, I can only assume that it was ditched in an effort to push SkyDrive.

@AC, 2012 18:59 GMT

Huge off-topic follow:

Google are not that outrageously naive as they might seem to be. In the world where "rounded corners", exFAT long filenames could be patented and sued for, they should better have something to counter that ugly unfair thermonuclear menace.

B&N did it differently by complaining to the authorities and publishing everything Microsoft tried to keep secret about, so everyone could get an idea how ludicrous and baseless those patent claims were and ended up getting $300m of investments.

Again, Google decided to make money not on software. The founders were not high school drop-outs like Billy Gates, the BASIC expert, or Stevie Jobs, a designer genius. They were Math and IT majors, nurtured by a different culture, I suppose. Neither do they ( so far) have any psychopathic problems similar to Larry Ellison's, nor did contract any of Apple's megalomaniac lunacy (I hope when Apple lawyers cough or sneeze in court, they do cover their mouths ;-)).

Should Google change their attitude towards the current patents plague, like MS once had done, they would become equally evil.

As far as their privacy controversy is concerned, can't comment here much. They make money on advertising. Don't see any issues here anyways, since they won't divulge your name to companies, but your preferences. With all the crappy flash, js in the stupid ads a poor human being has to deal with on the daily basis, it's hard to make it worse. Just get a noscript, flashkiller and adkiller, try using text browser in some cases.

It isn't right till version 7

The main reason i quit the software business was windows 3. I got sick and tired of being blamed by my customers for application crashes caused by that substandard OS. After the umpteenth time of: Sorry that's an OS error nothing i can do and then getting a mouthful from an irrate customer i had enough.

Re: "the music volume isn't independent of ringer volume"

I'm really tempted..

Would like to take the plunge and try a Lumia 920 but I live in Spain and buying one unlocked is difficult and expensive... I may just save the hassle and get the Nexus 4, it's cheaper, I know that Android is a good OS and more importantly for me I can order online at a low price and get it delivered unlocked straight to my door. I know I'm not the typical contract customer but I am interested in WP8 I think I'm probably just too lazy to go to the hassle of getting hold of one. Please Nokia or Microsoft just open an online store and sell me one directly!